Latest

The 2009 Reporters Without Borders – Fnac Press Freedom Prize was awarded today to Israeli newspaper reporter Amira Hass and the Chechen quarterly Dosh at a ceremony hosted by journalist Bernard de La Villardière at the Espace Fondation EDF in Paris.

The Amnesty prize for 2009 goes to psychologist Nora Sveaas, right, for her strong engagement towards refugees’ and asylum seekers’ rights, and for her several years’ long work to secure adequate health care for people fleeing torture and mistreatment. Through her efforts, Sveaass has contributed to bringing a well-hidden problem into the public domain.

-Power does not provide immunity, warned International Criminal Court prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo today, in his tenth briefing to the UN Security Council on ICC’s investigations of war crimes and crimes against humanity possibly committed in Darfur, Western Republic of the Sudan, since these investigations begun in 2005.

Belarusian human rights defenders are concerned with the continuing practice of the death penalty in their country. -This problem requires the fastest possible solution, they say. -It violates the right to life and is not in line with humanitarian principles. Now, Belarusian authorities are finally paying attention as well.

Not for the first time, not all of a sudden or without warning are we confronted with the problem of an empty wall again. Stripping the wall of symbols can be the consequence of the idea that we are all different and all equal at the same time. And so we stand in front of one, common wall.

Three journalists were killed today in an explosion that rocked a hotel in a government-controlled quarter of the Somali capital, Mogadishu, where a graduation ceremony for Banadir University was taking place.

Russian human rights defenders are concerned about the human rights situation in the Chechen Republic. The alarm is progressing because the powers, both on federal and on regional levels do not make any serious efforts to investigate the violations of human rights in the region and sometimes even stand in the way of independent investigations.

On the occasion of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, B.a.B.e. devoted their activities to actualization of sex crime issues, having in mind that sexual harassment, rapes and other sex crimes clearly show how hard it is to eliminate prejudices that are being present in the heads of individuals and communities for centuries.

The South East Europe Media Organisation (SEEMO) is worried about political interference towards public broadcasters across South East and Central Europe. It is cause for alarm that in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo, Republic of Croatia and Hungary, public service journalists, editors and managers experience political, financial and economic pressure.

Belarusian human rights defenders have prepared an alternative universal report on the human rights situation in the Republic of Belarus. The report has been submitted to the UN Human Rights Council at a meeting with the UN mission in Minsk.

Blogger and journalism student Emílio Moreno da Silva Neto, 33, from Brazil, was ordered by a Ceará state judge to pay R$16,000 (approx. US$9,200) in damages due to a comment posted on his blog. Another journalist, Pamela Martin, was caught in gunfire when working on a report about illegal fishing.

Беларускія праваабаронцы падрыхтавалі альтэрнатыўны універсальны даклад па сітуацыі ў Беларусі, які перадалі ў Раду правоў чалавека ААН. З гэтай нагоды адбылася сустрэча ў Прадстаўніцтве ААН у Беларусі.